Representatives of totalitarian countries, where the state controls all areas of a citizen’s life, often became victims of honey traps. Swallows were apparently used to recruit the Russian military intelligence GRU Filatov, who was working in the consulate in Algeria, the Russian spy Ogorodnikov in Columbia and even UN Deputy Secretary General Shevchenko. As far as I’m aware, in the latter case the ‘swallow’ was sent by the FBI, which is not surprising – these guys have no moral principles and sometimes I think they are prepared to do anything to achieve a result.
And now Steve… I suddenly felt as disgusted as if I had stepped on a toad with bare feet. Herr Hagen was lured into a honey trap like a bull into mating. Bulls are given a special aphrodisiac, a so-called bovine exciter, which gets them going. With Herr Hagen, it was plain alcohol that was the aphrodisiac.
The trap into which the German fell was the stepped one – first the rigged accident then the honey trap. If the victim managed to get out of the first one, just as Herr Hagen tried to, then the second one would be triggered.
The sappers and demo men call it a ‘second fuse’. It’s hidden in the depth of the infernal machine and waits its time. When disarming a mine, the specialist snips the necessary wires, takes off the tension from the contacts, inserts the circuit breakers in their place and then when he is finally convinced his job is done and the mine is defused, suddenly there’s a big boom and the sapper disappears in a cloud of hot plasma.
Herr Hagen had no chances. The octopus needed him – and the octopus got him.
‘Al-alright…’ he pronounced barely audibly, sobbing and sniffing like a child. ‘I will sign it all. But I…’
‘Well done!’ the paladin said contentedly. ‘You chose the right side, and got the winning ticket. A big and successful future awaits you, Herr Hagen. Congratulations!’
‘Leave it… Stop!’ the German exclaimed with pain in his voice. ‘You… You…’
‘Emotions,’ the agent reminded. ‘These are just emotions, dear partner. Alright, I understand. You’re tired… go, get some rest, have a drink, relax. When your services are needed, someone will contact you. Most likely, it’ll be an offer to meet under an innocent pretext, so remember to check your emails. And remember the code phrase: ‘Rumpelstiltskin can spin straw into gold’. And now go!
I shied away from the door on tiptoe, trying to make as little noise as possible, walked away, hiding around the corner of the corridor. Luckily, there were no surveillance cameras in the internal areas of the consulate, to save any information leaks, and nobody saw me.
A little more than a day later I left Zurich.”
01:49 A.M._
“Methods which the special services employ are always considered dirty,” the Lawyer noted. “A lot of books, movies and stories in the press are dedicated to this subject, but when you come across them in reality, everything you saw or read before fades away.”
“Tell me, did you have a similar experience?” Kold asked.
“Yes,” the Lawyer admitted. “For example I had to defend one diplomat, also a writer of horror novels, who was accused of working for the MI6. What’s more, the prosecution claimed that to contact the British ‘james bonds’ he used some incredibly complicated equipment which not even every professional IT worker would know how to use. The thing is, he was, how to put it, not all there – or to be more precise, he suffered a serious mental illness. It was so severe that when he was abroad, he would sometimes spend hours wandering across town, unable to find his own house. Once, tired and lost, he went into a park, bought himself a hamburger, sat on the grass and began to eat it. Then a dog came up and grabbed the hamburger from his hands, ate it and run away. So he bought himself a Swiss knife, spent a few days tracking down the dog then caught and dismembered it. How a man like this could work for the Russian MFA (the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) – I have no idea. As a result I had to enter into polemics on the pages of mass media with representatives of our counterintelligence who were very proud that they had caught such a scary ‘super agent’. And the English also did well with the story – they could report that they had recruited a ‘prominent Russian diplomat’.
In the end, he was recognised as mentally ill and sent for compulsory treatment. For some reason our counterintelligence weren’t too upset with me. I am even a member of the Public Council of the FSB – that’s the public control on the special services…
But Mr. Kold, if I begin to tell you about it in detail now, we will have to swap our seats – you’ll take the Dictaphone and I will start on my memories.”
“Who knows,” Kold smiled, “Maybe one day it will happen. But you’re right – everybody should do their own job, so I’ll get back to my story…”
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“I was really ill when I came back from Zurich – maybe the Alps’ icy breath did chill something in my body. So I was wrapped up in three blankets, shaking with fever, suffocating from a never ending cough and stuck for a few days in my bachelor flat without food or internet. The thing is, while I was still in Europe I had contacted my seniors and asked for a few days off, as compensation for all that overtime. Nobody objected and that’s why nobody was looking for me now.
I was so tired I didn’t even turn the lights on in the evenings, making my way to the toilet by feeling along the wall. I had no pets, lover, or friends. In short, I didn’t have anybody who could’ve remembered about me.
The illness only strengthened that odd and scary emptiness which had appeared inside me back in Zurich and was getting more and more overwhelming with each hour, with each day.
For the first two days I was convinced I would die and I accepted it with gratitude. Death for me was karmic retribution for the wrong I had done in Zurich helping Steve – that’s why I didn’t call anyone, completely surrendering to the will of providence.
I was lying in bed, looking into the ringing silence and whispering Buddhist mantras I learned back in the Garage:
‘AUM-SHRI-GAIYA-ADI-SHIVA-GAIYA-ADI-KALI-GAIYA-ADI-KALA-BHAIRAVA-NAMAH-FORAM: in order to rid myself of addiction and leave this world pure;
REM-RAO-AUM: in order to destroy anything bad in me;
OM-MAHADEVAIYA-NAMAH: in order for the Great Absolute to accept me as I am.’
Sometimes it seemed to me that the demons were holding me and not letting me pass into the next world. But I read and learned by heart the Tibetan book of the dead Bardo Thodol, and its first stage Chikhai Bardo:
‘The time of your departure from this Reality is drawing nearer. The signs of Death in feelings follow. The immersion of Earth into Cold Water; the earth is filled with Cold as it sinks; it chills and pours lead; Water becomes Fire; throes of hot and Cold; Fire becomes Air; Explosion and Disintegration with sparks fading into emptiness. These are the elements preparing us for the moment of death, by mutually swapping. When Fire scatters into the Emptiness of Air, it’s time for you to enter Chikhai Bardo. Avoid absentmindedness, pull yourself together, look, listen… Pay attention. Try to recognise praeternal Trinity, Tri-Kaya.
Dharma-Kaya, the Law, is like a desert sky without Air, which is held only by light.
Sambhoga Kaya, Wisdom, is like a Rainbow in That Sky.
Nirmana-Kaya, Embodiment, is like a Nimbus of the holy ones in the vale of tears.
Soon you’ll breath out your last breath and it will stop. Then you will see praeternal Pure Light. An incredible space will swing open before you, endless, like an Ocean without waves under the cloudless sky.